


Earl Grey

by evil_bunny_king



Series: Wolfhounds [1]
Category: Dragon Age: Inquisition
Genre: F/M, Modern AU, dog-sitting AU
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2015-11-12
Updated: 2015-11-12
Packaged: 2018-05-01 05:42:07
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,540
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/5194325
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/evil_bunny_king/pseuds/evil_bunny_king
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>“Coming, sorry!” she called as she swiped her keys from the bowl. Gently nudging (make that shoving) the beast back with her hip, she fumbled her keys towards the lock and peeked out of the door’s upper window at her visitor.</p><p>Her hand stopped mid-motion.</p><p>There was a man with the most beautiful eyes on her doorstep.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Earl Grey

**Author's Note:**

  * For [flabbadence](https://archiveofourown.org/users/flabbadence/gifts).



There was a dog in Abora’s living room.

She blinked at it. Shuffled towards the wall as she patted her sides in search of a pocket, her  _phone_ , staring at the snorting bundle of fur that occupied her sofa.

She didn’t own a dog. Her mother didn’t own a dog. Yet a dog easily filled the entirety of the three-seater, shaggy hair and long, gangly limbs, supine and content in the midst of her pillows.

She watched as it took the moment to stretch, its claws scratching against the faux leather (she winced) - before it collapsed back into the cushions, relaxing with a soft ‘whuff’.

It peeked at her over the sofa arm. Blinked. Licked lazily at its teeth – and these were large teeth – and watched her with eyes half-mast.

Well then.

She continued to rake her hands down the sides of her sweater, finally dragging her eyes away to frown at her front when she had no luck. Phone.  _Phone-_

Sweater. Right. No pockets. And she’d chosen today to wear the skirt.

Plan B.

Flicking her gaze back to the beast – it was  _moving_  dear god, rolling onto its belly- she scuttled sideways into the adjoining kitchen for the landline.

Her mother picked up after the second ring.

“Hi honey!” Her welsh accent still burred over the phone. “Sleep well? I’m sorry I had to run out like that, but Rob called and-”

“Mum.” She instilled the word with as much urgency as she could while keeping her voice low, attempting to avoid attracting the beast’s attention. It slid to the floor with a thump regardless.  _Shit._  “There’s a dog in the house.”

“What? I can’t quite hea-”

“ _There’s a dog in the house_. Size of a pony, black, teeth the length of my arm-” The dog trotted into the kitchen and she stiffened at her station behind the island counter, forcing her breath steady. Its irises were dark enough to be black, almost indistinguishable from its pupils, and now that it was closer she could confirm that it – yep, definitely stood as tall as her hip _._

And it was still moving, she saw with growing horror, even as she shuffled away and it barely paused before shoving its nose into her forearm, snuffling happily. She flinched, locked her muscles in order to keep herself still. Her voice reduced to a squeak. “S-size of a pony, big dog, mum, kinda hard to miss-”

“Oh, you mean Tristan?”

She stared at the wall. Stared at the dog. Forced another unsteady breath as the dog continued to nose along her clothing, snorting in excitement and stepping on her bare toes.

It had a name. And was an apparent friend of the family. _For the love of-_

“Tristan, the neighbour’s dog–! Don’t worry dear, he couldn’t hurt a fly, he’s the friendliest thing. Solas asked if we could watch him, but then Rob called and I had to run out to give him a hand- he’s moving his mum’s things to storage today, poor thing, and I’d clean forgotten about it until he called….”

Abora watched the dog as it whuffed at her hands, eyes wide. Her mother was still talking but she was, quite honestly, struggling to listen.

It  _was_  being surprisingly gentle, she could admit, grudgingly. Contenting itself with licking between her fingers despite her efforts to pull her hands free, lipping at her palms, careful despite his monumental size. She even found that the tension in her shoulders had eased, a little, the line of them softening into something approaching human. But only a little. He still was, after all, a mammoth, huge, jawed _beast_  of a- 

She cut that train of thought right off and turned away from the dog slightly to refocus on her mother’s words, taking a shaky breath, resting an elbow on the counter.

“…Honey? Did you not get my note?”

Right. Note. She ran a hand through her hair. She hadn’t seen one. Then again, she hadn’t lingered in her room to look, instead staggering off in search of painkillers for the jet-lag induced sledge hammer that was still pounding against he-

The beast chose that moment to rear onto its hind legs, taking advantage of her distraction to launch itself at her front, and she found herself trying to ward it off an enthusiastic attack to her  _face._

She flailed away, the phone spinning from her hands.

 “Ouch, dammit- no, no! Bad-“Its tongue caught the inside of her mouth mid-word and she spat, vehemently, shoving at its chest and twisting her head away- “NO, BAD dog! Down! Stop!”

She staggered as it rolled off of her and immediately hopped back up in a renewed attempt, huge paws landing heavily on her shoulders (it was taller than her by the gods her entire head could fit in its mouth) - wheezing at it to  _sit, sit_  as it licked stripes of saliva from her chin to her  _hair._

She downright almost fell over when it actually obeyed.

It sat heavily on the floor before her, tail beating a frenetic rhythm against the cabinet, vibrating obviously with restraint.

She wiped her (now sticky) hair from her face, fluttering a hand over her thundering heart. Retrieved the phone, miraculously still in one piece and on the counter, and turned it the right way up in her hands, trying to ignore the way her fingers were shaking.

“Down,” she attempted, keeping a close eye on it as she tried to muster her wits back together, pointing with her free hand. The beast slid obediently onto its belly, kicking its back legs to the side, its tongue lolling out of the side of its mouth as it blinked up at her.

The action made it look surprisingly ridiculous.

She blinked back at it for a moment, taking this in. “Good boy. Yes.  _Stay_.”

Her mother’s voice was bemused when she finally pressed the phone back to ear.The beast shifted impatiently when her attention shifted away from it, obviously sensing another opportunity to lunge, but stilled at her warning gesture, finally resting its head on its paws.

“Are you alright, dear? I said yes I did leave a note, did you not find it?

 _Evidently not_  is what she wanted to say, but that wasn’t fair, she knew that, so she mustered herself back together with a shaky sigh, splaying the fingers of her free hand across the countertop.

She’d survived fire fights, IEDS, aerial bombardment. She would survive a dog.

So. Action.

“How long do you reckon you’re going to be?”

The phone hummed thoughtfully in her ear. “Well, we’ve only just begun and there’s an entire house to clear out. We won’t be done today, certainly- and I was rather hoping you’d be able to give us a hand, once you’d recovered a little. Your young bones could help Rob with the heavier items, make the trip to the tip easier. We are getting on, you know.”

Her mother was forty six. Her grandmother was a sprightly seventy year old, determinedly continuing her consulting career part-time in the City while lecturing at a University a plane-ride away and maintaining her impeccable garden. Only one of them complained about their age.

Abora rubbed her hand across her throbbing forehead – grimacing when she realised she was just smearing the slime into the skin – and forced that thought down and away, too. Brooding on her mother’s eccentricities solved nothing and, after her long absence, was once again unfair. “Of course I’ll help. What I meant was - when is this - Solas coming to retrieve his hellhound?”

Her mother laughed. “Irish wolfhound, dear – and he said he’d be back early afternoon, he just had an unexpected meeting in the city.”

She squinted at the clock. Almost ten. Two hours at least, then? She gave another sigh.

“Alright then. Thanks mum. Have fun.”

Another warm laugh. “You too dear – Tristan really is the loveliest thing, I’ve looked after him before and he spent most of the time sleeping. He really won’t be a bother, so try not to fret, alright?”

“Right.”

She hung up, glancing briefly at the phone’s cradle across the room before deciding it wasn’t worth it. She gazed down at the dog, folding her arms across her chest.

It blinked back, eyes wide now, and somehow pleading, tail swishing slowly across the kitchen tiles.

It seemed much calmer now, at least.

She sighed yet again. It was that kind of day.

“Come on, then. Let’s go watch TV. Something ridiculous and Scottish, I’m thinking. I’m sure you’ll enjoy it.”

Within five minutes they’d successfully hashed out a compromise over the living room sofas. She sat stubbornly on the edge seat while the dog sprawled across the rest, its back feet bunched against her hip, muzzle on the opposite side-cushion, snoring happily through the pilot of Outlander.

It was a quarter to four when the doorbell finally rang.

* * *

 A single, phenomenally loud bark heralded the doorbell. The clatter of claws on tile, a skitter across polished woodwork, and then the beast in the hallway, scratching at the front door before she could disentangle herself from her low stretch and whining as if starved.

She had actually fed it, by the by. The evidence of this now lay strewn across the kitchen floor, alongside a half-decimated bowl of kibble (scooped from the monumentally heavy bag of food that she’d found propped by the front door) and a water bowl with inflated pieces of kibble bobbing along its rim.

Swallowing a grumble, Abora levered herself upright and shook herself out, swiping a hand across her brow in the process. It was, in all likelihood, this ‘Solas’ her mother had told her about. Her new neighbour. Very, very late (‘early afternoon’ her ass).

She had been able to get through most of her yoga routine, at least. The dog had bored of watching her bend about on the floor after its first few invasive sniffs and had flopped back to sleep, claiming the entire couch in her absence. The exercise hadn’t been enough to stop her dwelling on certain topics, of course, not quite - but it was something, regardless.

She pinched briefly at the bridge of her nose, her fought-for sense of calm fading with each renewed whine, and forced herself to pad into the entrance hall.

“Coming, sorry!” she called as she swiped her keys from the bowl. Gently nudging (make that shoving) the dog back with her hip, she fumbled her keys towards the lock and peeked out of the door’s upper window at her visitor.

Her hand stopped mid-motion.

There was a man with the most beautiful eyes on her doorstep.

Comfortably dressed in a woolen trench coat, with a rich green beanie pulled over his ears and a matching scarf around his neck, the man waited patiently on her welcome mat, head tilted towards the sounds of the dog scratching. His eyes flicked to hers as she popped into view, clear and slate-blue in the winter light, and she blinked back at him, momentarily stilled.

She didn’t recognize him, of course, but  _he_  seemed to recognize the bark that burst from the dog at her side (apparently she was moving too slowly), and a smile graced full lips, grazing against his turned up collar.

Abora pulled herself swiftly away from the window.

Handsome stranger, he was. Time to be gazing doe-eyed after him, it was not.

Winding a hand into the beast’s collar (a fruitless effort - but she thought she should make the attempt, for appearance’s sake), and pointedly ignoring the fact that she was dressed in her yoga clothing and sweaty to boot, she finally unlocked the door and began to drag it open.

“Hello,” she began, directing a smile at her visitor – but got no further before the dog successfully wriggled around the door.

Unsurprisingly, it threw itself over the threshold, wrenching Abora with it.

She stumbled painfully into the doorframe, wincing as she collided with it, her grip on the collar slipping free (dammit, she shouldn’t have even tried) and the dog bounded around the stranger, ferreting his hands from his pockets. The man laughed (thank god), and bent to welcome it, burying his hands in its coat. It was a light, warm sound, disintegrating into chuckles as he received a lick to the chin, and she watched as the beast seated itself at the visitor’s feet, craning backwards for a belly rub.

It was a perfectly domestic image. The beast - Tristan - seemed almost transformed, dark eyes glazing with bliss.

“Solas, is it?” she asked, wrapping her arms under her chest and around her bruised side.

He looked up with a lopsided smile still tugging his lips, still tickling, although he sobered some as he refocused on her in the doorway.

She ignored her slight pang of regret to see the ease of it go.

“Ah – yes.” Straightening, he gave a quiet command and the dog immediately scrambled upright, bristling energy miraculously contained. Solas rested a fond hand between his ears. “And you must be Ms Lavellan's daughter. It’s a pleasure to meet you. Thank you both for watching Drystan, it was of considerable help.”

His voice was surprisingly smooth, soft but clear, and she found herself smiling back at him, despite the way her feet were slowly numbing on the cool stone and the bite of the autumn air.

“Drystan?”

He meant the beast, obviously, but there was something odd about the way he said its name, the way the ‘r’ rolled on his tongue.

His eyes creased with another smile - one less warm than before, but just as sincere. “A welsh name, of similar root to ‘Tristan’, but with additional meaning. In some translations it means ‘full of sorrow’, in others ‘Herald’. It was an idle choice. But your family is welsh, is it not?”

It was her turn to smile ruefully. “I haven’t lived there in many years, but yes, we’re welsh.”

There was a pause, then. Comfortable, if with the potential to be awkward, and she considered the two of them, the way the chill ruffled through scarf and fur.

“It’s nice to meet you, Solas,” she found herself saying, leaning against the door jamb. She unwrapped an arm to gesture inside. “Would you like to come in? I’ll make us a cup of tea.”

He was shaking his head before she even finished the question. “I wouldn’t want to impose further. But thank you.”

“I insist. T-  _Drystan_  was just eating when you arrived,” technically true. “It’d be a shame for all of that food to go to waste.”

His brows raised and he seemed to consider her for a moment, consider her offer, the dog shuffling at his feet. She tightened her arms around herself and shivered as a breeze kicked up as well, raising goose-pimples across her bare arms. In either case, she didn’t want to be outside for much longer.

“Alright, then.” She looked back up and his more lopsided smile was back, tilting his mouth in the most pleasant of ways (stop it). He nodded. “As you insist. We would be delighted.”

She gave a little laugh and led the two of them back into the house.

**Author's Note:**

> THIS IS A LATE BDAY PRESENT FOR A WONDERFUL PERSON


End file.
